Satan’s Enmity Against the Law
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grew fainter. Both king and people exulted in their power, and mocked
the God of Israel. This grew until it culminated in the Pharaoh who
was confronted by Moses. When the Hebrew leader came before
the king with a message from “Jehovah, God of Israel,” it was not
ignorance of the true God, but defiance of His power, that prompted
the answer, “Who is Jehovah, that I should obey His voice? ... I know
not Jehovah.” From first to last, Pharaoh’s opposition to the divine
command was not the result of ignorance, but of hatred and defiance.
Though the Egyptians had so long rejected the knowledge of God,
the Lord still gave them opportunity for repentance. In the days of
Joseph, Egypt had been an asylum for Israel; God had been honored
in the kindness shown His people; and now the long-suffering One,
slow to anger, and full of compassion, gave each judgment time to
do its work; the Egyptians, cursed through the very objects they had
worshiped, had evidence of the power of Jehovah, and all who would,
might submit to God and escape His judgments. The bigotry and
stubbornness of the king resulted in spreading the knowledge of God,
and bringing many of the Egyptians to give themselves to His service.
It was because the Israelites were so disposed to connect them-
selves with the heathen and imitate their idolatry that God had per-
mitted them to go down into Egypt, where the influence of Joseph
was widely felt, and where circumstances were favorable for them to
remain a distinct people. Here also the gross idolatry of the Egyptians
and their cruelty and oppression during the latter part of the Hebrew
sojourn should have inspired in them an abhorrence of idolatry, and
should have led them to flee for refuge to the God of their fathers. This
very providence Satan made a means to serve his purpose, darkening
the minds of the Israelites and leading them to imitate the practices
of their heathen masters. On account of the superstitious veneration
in which animals were held by the Egyptians, the Hebrews were not
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permitted, during their bondage, to present the sacrificial offerings.
Thus their minds were not directed by this service to the great Sacri-
fice, and their faith was weakened. When the time came for Israel’s
deliverance, Satan set himself to resist the purposes of God. It was
his determination that that great people, numbering more than two
million souls, should be held in ignorance and superstition. The people
whom God had promised to bless and multiply, to make a power in
the earth, and through whom He was to reveal the knowledge of His